Venezuela Maintaining Surge in Housing Construction

Punto Fijo, November 6^th, 2012 (Venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuela continues to see a big surge in housing construction since the government launched the “Great Venezuelan Housing Mission” in April of last year.

According to government sources, around 265 thousand new homes have been constructed since the new initiative was launched last year, with the goal being to construct 3 million new homes by 2019 in order to confront a major housing deficit in the country.

The surge in government investment in this area has been a boon to private sector construction firms. The construction industry has seen 17 consecutive quarters of growth, including growth of 17 percent in the last quarter.

“Venezuela is the only country that has built more than 200 thousand homes in a year,” said private constructor Carmelo de Estéfano Ramírez. “No country has been able to do something like that. The best have made around 70 thousand, if that, in a year”.

Private sector construction companies gathered yesterday in Caracas to discuss plans to build 100 thousand homes per year in the coming years as part of the government housing initiative.

The objective of the three-day meeting is to bring together private and state-sector companies to form joint plans for producing and supplying inputs to the rapidly growing sector, while also keeping costs down.

President of the Bolivarian Construction Chamber, Gerson Hernández, noted that although most of the inputs are produced domestically, it has been necessary to import materials from other countries like Peru, Italy, Argentina, and Colombia due to the high demand of the housing projects.

“This is something completely new,” he said. “There’s never been so much construction in so many areas at the same time”.

The private sector, he noted, was not prepared for the explosion in demand for construction materials created by the new push for housing.

Representatives from communal councils and socialist communes were also present at the meeting. Communal councils also carry out many construction projects in their communities and in the process receive technical assistance from the private and state sectors.

At the closing of the meeting on Wednesday, members of the construction chamber will present their joint plans to government officials for review.